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MOOCs (Massive Open Online
Course) are interactive online courses that typically are free and open to
anyone with an Internet connection. Like
earlier free online course offerings, e.g., MIT's OCW (Open CourseWare)
initiative, they provide resources such as videos, recommended readings, and problem
sets. They differ from these earlier
online courses in two major ways: the courses are designed for online use
instead of being copies of on-site existing courses, and they are structured
around interactive social networks, called user forums.

Currently there are three major MOOC
vendors: Coursera (www.coursera.org), edX (www.edx.org), and Udacity
(www.udacity.com). While the format for
the three is similar, Udacity differs from Coursera and edX in that it does not
have a calendar-based schedule; students may start a course at any time.

The figure below from
Stanford (http://www.stanforddaily.com/2013/02/05/a-look-at-online-education-coursera-edx-and-udacity/online-education-page-1/) summarizes key
components: history, number of universities, number of courses, number of
students, and whether they are for-profit or non-profit.